Innholdsfortegnelse for January - February 2024 i Classic Pop

As you’ll see by the strength of our ‘Best of 2023’ feature this issue, it’s been a really solid year for a whole host of our favourite artists. We’ve covered it all here in Classic Pop, of course, via world exclusive A-list interviews with the likes of Duran Duran, Pet Shop Boys, The New Power Generation and Andrew Ridgeley to name just a handful, meaning you will always hear about the big-hitters in these pages first. Apart from CP’s annual retrospective overview of what turned our heads across the last 12 months we’re also looking forward to what is already shaping up to be a very busy 2024. Leading the way are our iconic cover stars Bananarama who will not only grace the stage of the London Palladium for two…

Blondie’s Chris Stein has revealed that he may never play with the group again. Talking to The Sunday Times, the guitarist, who co-formed the band with his then-girlfriend Debbie Harry in 1974, admitted that he often feels “fatigued” and has come to terms with the fact he might never tour again. Stein last performed with Blondie in 2019 and in 2022 issued a statement explaining his absence from the live lineup, saying, “I’m sad and frustrated to report that I’m not going out with the next bunch of Blondie touring. I’ve been dealing with a dumbass condition called Atrial Fibrillation or AFib, which is irregular heartbeats and combined with the meds I take for it I’m too fatigued to deal.” He was later diagnosed with prostate cancer. Now, talking to…

As Classic Pop went to press, news broke of the sad death of Shane MacGowan, aged 65. The Pogues frontman passed away following a recent hospital stay where he had been diagnosed with encephalitis. A statement from MacGowan’s spokesperson said the singer had died peacefully in the early hours of the morning on 30 November with his family by his side. MacGowan fronted The Pogues from 1982 through to their eventual split in 2014. Their most famous song was Fairytale Of New York, a festive classic also featuring Kirsty MacColl. A documentary about the Pogues frontman’s life, Crock Of Gold: A Few Rounds With Shane MacGowan, was released in 2020. Irish President Michael D. Higgins paid tribute to MacGowan calling him one of music’s greatest lyricists: “So many of his…

George Michael scored a No.1 on the US Albums Chart on 16 January 1988 with his debut solo LP Faith. The record would stay inside the US Top 10 for 51 non-consecutive weeks, including 12 weeks at the summit. It reached No.1 in the UK as well, but bizarrely just for one week. Still, it remains one of the best-selling albums of all time, having shifted more than 25 million copies worldwide, and was certified Diamond by the Recording Industry Association Of America in 1996. It was also an awards hoover, scooping Album of the Year at the 31st Grammys and Favourite Soul/R&B Album at the 1989 American Music Awards. And this wasn’t a case where the public and critics were of opposing opinions with even the usually sniffy Rolling…

Not all wizards wear capes. Some wear thick-rimmed glasses. Trevor Horn is the Emeritus Professor figure of the New Pop of the 1980s. Sipping a mug of tea in a conservatory on a grotty English autumn afternoon, he has the relaxed but authoritative air of a man who has nothing left to (im)prove. Between 1979 – his arrival as leader of the Buggles – and the petering out of the Frankie Goes To Hollywood project circa 1986, Trevor Horn established himself as the producer who all other practitioners of the pristine called ‘boss’. His rise truly began when he coaxed the washed-up pop duo Dollar into making the best three singles of their career, pulling a similar Henry Higgins-esque stunt to that carried off by Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards…

01 (1) SAVE YOUR LOVE RENÉE AND RENATO (HOLLYWOOD) SAVE YOUR LOVE RENÉE AND RENATO (HOLLYWOOD) Italian-born and Birmingham-bred Renato Pagliari had been singing most of his 35 years before he made his telly debut on the ITV talent show New Faces in 1975. There, he’d impressed record producer (and creator of Metal Mickey, fact fans) Johnny Edward who gifted him with this cruise-boat favourite. Pairing him with British vocalist Hilary Lester the duo were remonickered Renée And Renato, releasing the Just One Cornetto-like Save Your Love in October 1982. Those watching the video may have been thinking they were seeing the real Renée, except that Lester’s place was taken by a model, Val Penny. The song made Christmas No.1, but would prove to be the only hit for the…

In the early 80s, savvy record labels were well aware of the proliferating popularity of the 12-inch remix – a phenomenon that originated in the disco era – and realised they could create entire albums on a tight budget using previously released material, and often with little artist involvement. For many consumers and critics the remix album was just a stopgap release – or worse still an opportunistic moneygrabbing exercise – but more often than not these mid-priced collections allowed artists to present their work in a very different light. Some even turned the format into a veritable art form. Covering the period 1981 to 1990, we’ve picked out a decade’s worth of these pocket money-friendly delights. 20 GO WEST BANGS & CRASHES (1986) By the time Go West had…

1 BEE GEES: CHILDREN OF THE WORLD BOB STANLEY (NINE EIGHT BOOKS) The story of pop’s most successful underdogs recounted in meticulous detail. Bob Stanley’s superbly crafted tribute to the Gibb brothers and the experimentalism of their remarkable discography doesn’t so much ask for, it demands respect and re-evaluation of the group’s work. Long overdue, the Bee Gees finally have the biography that they deserve. 2 MADONNA: A REBEL LIFE MARY GABRIEL (CORONET) Celebrating the pop icon’s 40th year in music, Mary Gabriel casts a critical eye over Madonna’s full career, examining the singer’s role in pop culture, feminism and sexual politics. At close to 900 pages, A Rebel Life focuses on the art and treats her work with the gravitas it deserves – and emerges as the best Madonna…

REAL WORLD If Peter Gabriel’s first album of new material in more than 20 years hasn’t arrived with quite the fanfare you’d expect, that’s because all its songs are already out in the wild, the former Genesis frontman having released a new track on every full moon of the year. Why? Because he’s Peter Gabriel, and he does that sort of thing. As you might expect from an artist knocking on the door of 74, it’s the quieter moments of autumnal reflection that prove the highlights on i/o. Playing For Time is a lushly romantic, Randy Newman-inspired meditation on age and memory, while the gorgeous Love Can Heal pulses and shimmers like a modern Mercy Street, its swooning cello and softly sighing chorus of female vocals (including Gabriel’s daughter Melanie)…

LOMA VISTA ★★★ Wondering if they were going to continue after 2021’s Path Of Wellness failed to chart, riot grrrl veterans Sleater-Kinney instead changed their record label and had nearly finished writing their fourth album since reforming in 2015 when Carrie Brownstein’s mother and stepfather were killed in a car crash. The songs remained unchanged, but Brownstein wanted to focus on guitar in the tragedy’s aftermath, rather than alternate vocal/guitar duties with Corin Tucker. You can try to pick out signs of Brownstein’s grief if you must, but Little Rope is simply the duo at their concise best: all 10 songs last 2m 50s to 3m 50s, and the power chords on the closing Untidy Creature is as near as it gets to a ballad. Aided by David Byrne/Sparks producer…

DANGERBIRD ★★ Grandaddy’s second album since reforming and their first since bassist Kevin Garcia died from a stroke shortly after 2017’s release of Last Place, the title of Blu Wav is drawn from Jason Lytle’s claim that it mixes bluegrass and New Wave. Quite where the New Wave influence can be detected is a mystery, as it hasn’t made it to the music. Other than a sci-fi swoosh underneath the wordless harmonies in the brief Let’s Put This Pinto On The Moon, the Californians are at their most conservative on a succession of country ballads. Lytle is proud of finally incorporating pedal steel into Grandaddy’s music. It would have blended into much of their past, but it’s oddly bloodless in dominating half of Blu Wav, often making them sound like…

COOKING VINYL ★★★★ Perennial live favourites since first reforming in 2007, A Matter Of Time is only the Britpoppers’ second LP since. Produced again by Youth, who helmed 2017’s Instant Pleasures, the Sheds’ sixth album is exactly what they need: virtually all 12 songs sound like instant festival favourites. Let’s Go and Talk Of The Town have the same raucous energy as She Left Me On Friday, while the mournful Let’s Go Dancing will have anyone who found something in their eye whenever Chasing Rainbows came on the radio belting along by the second chorus. Sure, these choruses are route-one, but that’s harder to pull off than tune-free prog excursions, with slowbuilding Tripping With You – featuring standout harmonies from Reverend And The Makers’ Laura McClure – showing the Sheds…

IGNITION ★★★ A protégé of Gerry Cinnamon who counts Liam Gallagher and Suggs as fans, the Glasgow singer-songwriter has Shack’s mix of simple acoustics and emotional complexity in his finest songs. Fever is a communal strum, while What I Need is a singalong for the ages. With such a sparse accompaniment, other tunes can sound like demos, with Champs-Élysées resembling a Courteeners offcut. Thomas’ sharp lyrics and the naturalistic charm of his vocals generally carries him through, but more variety next time out would be welcome. JE…

NOW ★★★★★ People who don’t like disco are not to be trusted. That is cold fact. If anyone says to you they have no time for disco, end the conversation immediately. Block and report them forthwith. Because they’re just plain wrong. Looking back at the struggles disco faced from Authentic Music bores, you can understand why it was far more exciting and preferable than The Eagles or any of that nonsense. Back then, rock was a very Western and regional hetero affair, whereas disco was multiracial, multisexual, glamorous, extravagant and, above all, life. Disco was full of desire, longing, attraction, strings, important synthesizer pulses and ecstasy. No wonder the squares tried to destroy it with dismal – and it should be said, borderline racist – schemes such as the Disco…

LONDON ★★★☆ On its release in 2003, former Sugababe Siobhan Donaghy’s debut solo album failed to reach the UK Top 100. That doesn’t exactly shout that it’s worthy of a deluxe 20th anniversary reissue. Yet Revolution In Me merits its 2CD and accompanying new-to-vinyl update, as it’s long been spoken of by noughties pop students as a lost gem. If it’s not quite a classic, it nonetheless deserves its moment in a more poptivist climate than on its original release, when Donaghy was viewed as Sugababes’ Pete Best while her old band were flourishing with Heidi Range. Still only 19 years old, no wonder Donaghy sounds so wise, given the fallout from leaving Sugababes. First single Overrated, a No.19 hit, and As You Like It particularly embody the sophistication of…

BMG ★★★★ It’s one of music’s best trivia questions: Which member of The Police first released a solo album? Surprisingly, it’s not Sting but drummer Stewart Copeland, who tracked offbeat New Wave under the moniker Klark Kent from the late 1970s. Even more surprisingly, Klark Kent also reached the chart first: his bratty, punkish single I Don’t Care peaked at No.48 in the UK in 1978, several weeks before The Police debuted with Can’t Stand Losing You. This deluxe edition of Klark Kent’s 1980 debut album tacks on non-album singles and a pair of unreleased studio tracks, highlighted by the prog-pop earworm It’s Gonna Rain. A second disc features a dozen previously unreleased demos. Copeland handled vocals and played every instrument, including unorthodox noises such as typewriter and kazoo, all…

NOW ★★★★★/★★★★ /★★★★★ If you’re thinking after Now’s spectacular 2023 that they’ll put their feet up, the answer is a firm ‘No, they jolly well aren’t’. 1988 Yearbook Extra scoops up another 60 smashes proving it was one of the best pop years, with magic such as Superfly Guy, Domino Dancing, Doctorin’ The House plus Münchener Freiheit’s blubsome Keeping The Dream Alive and David Sylvian’s swooning Orpheus. Continuing their 12” 80s range with 1982 Part 1 with 48 full-lengths and reswizzles such as The Human League’s pounder Mirror Man, ABC’s luxuriant The Look Of Love, Associates’ strident Club Country among the top tier crackers – pure joy from end to end. And, oh boy, is the 29-track double vinyl Now 80s Dancefloor: Disco & Electro an absolute treat. Ask yourself:…

BFD ★★★☆ Many lockdown albums were melancholy and introspective affairs. But by no means all, as the two socially distanced collaborations between Tim Finn of Split Enz/Crowded House fame and Roxy Music guitarist Phil Manzanera proved. Both 2021’s Caught By The Heart and 2022’s The Ghost Of Santiago came replete with Latin rhythms and a kind of anticipatory joy that one day the world would open up again. Excuse enough to pick up this limited boxset that also includes newer EP, Viento En Popa. JW…

CHRYSALIS ★★★★ Recently given a new audience via Billie Eilish’s patronage, the debut by Luke Haines’ pop offshoot is reissued for its 25th anniversary on vinyl, a bonus 10” adding six B-sides. Designed to mock Britpop’s bombast, only to arrive when Blur and Pulp were howling into the void, Haines and John Moore’s sinister minimalism was perfectly offset by Sarah Nixey’s mordant vocals, all classically English hauteur and pitch black humour. Come for the chilling cover of Uptown Top Ranking, stay for Kidnapping An Heiress and Child Psychology’s wintry charms. JE…

FAT POSSUM ★★★☆ Eager to avoid the four-year gestation of 2001’s gospel-heavy Let It Come Down LP, in 2003 Spiritualized’s Jason Pierce opted for a more spontaneous approach to his band’s fifth studio album. Recorded in just three weeks, Amazing Grace is certainly rough and ready, with This Little Life Of Mine kicking off in filthy stoner fashion and She Kissed Me (It Felt Like A Hit) exhibiting a Stooges-like energy. There’s more grit in Never Goin’ Back and fury in Cheapster but, as usual, the band are best at their most awed (Oh Baby) or intimate (Lay It Down Slow). WW…

Anthem Publishing Suite 6, Piccadilly House, London Road, Bath, BA1 6PL Tel +44 (0)1225 489 984 www.classicpopmag.com WHAT WAS YOUR MUSICAL HIGHLIGHT OF 2023? EDITOR Steve Harnell steve.harnell@anthem.co.uk Prince – Diamonds And Pearls boxset *1 SENIOR ART EDITOR Alex Duce alex.duce@anthem.co.uk Depeche Mode – Before We Drown ADVERTISING MANAGER Leah Fitz-Henry leah.fitz-henry@anthem.co.uk Mel C at Camp Bestival SUB-EDITOR Rik Flynn The Netflix Wham! documentary SENIOR MARKETING EXECUTIVE Rosie Pankhurst rosie.pankhurst@anthem.co.uk Kylie Minogue’s Tension album DIGITAL EDITOR Steve O’Brien The Netflix Wham! documentary *2 CREATIVE DIRECTOR Jenny Cook jenny.cook@anthem.co.uk Discovering the Tiny Desks concerts on YouTube FOUNDER, EDITOR-AT-LARGE Ian Peel Frankie Goes to Hollywood at Eurovision CEO Jon Bickley jon.bickley@anthem.co.uk Madonna’s The Celebration Tour MANAGING DIRECTOR Simon Lewis simon.lewis@anthem.co.uk…

Indie group Gossip are to unveil their first album in 11 years. Real Power is set for release on 22 March 2024, via Sony Music Entertainment. The new album marks a reunion with producer Rick Rubin, who helmed the band’s 2009 LP Music For Men. At the coaxing of Rubin, the band started recording in 2019 after completing a tour for the 10-year anniversary of the latter album. Recorded at Rubin’s home studio in Kauai, Hawaii, the process was temporarily halted by the pandemic and resumed when restrictions lifted. “When we began, so much about Gossip was about running away – that was always in the music,” explains frontwoman Beth Ditto. “We survived. We came from nothing, and we got the fuck out of there. And to be here 20…

The Damned’s 80s line-up is to perform together for the first time in more than three decades as original drummer Rat Scabies joins Dave Vanian, Captain Sensible and Paul Gray on a nationwide tour next December. Drummer Scabies – real name Christopher Millar – last played with the band in 2022, but has now rejoined permanently. On the last tour, he played with Vanian, Captain Sensible and original member Brian James, but will now be reunited with the 80s lineup featuring Paul Gray, who joined in 1980, on bass. The group will be heading out on the 12-date UK jaunt, beginning 4 December in Newcastle and taking in such cities as Glasgow, Manchester, Leeds, Bristol and Cambridge, before climaxing at London’s Roundhouse on 18 December. According to the band, fans…

G IS FOR… GREATEST HITS SINGLES I have a strange affection for Greatest Hits singles. Not singles that were the biggest hits of their respective artists or groups. But singles that were recorded especially to appear on a retrospective compilation even though, very often, no one had ever heard them before. Let alone sent them to the top of the charts. You can imagine the conversation in stuffy record label offices: “What this band needs is a Greatest Hits! It will be the perfect way to restart their career,” says one. “Yes, but it needs a new track as well as all the old classics,” adds another. “But why, and what if it doesn’t become one of their greatest hits?” counters one. “It doesn’t matter – every album needs a…

1 PRINCE & THE NEW POWER GENERATION DIAMONDS AND PEARLS (NPG/WARNER) Prince’s team continue to set the gold standard for thoroughness in reissues. It helped that Diamonds And Pearls was Prince’s most straight-up pop album – and that there were so many superb previously unreleased songs offering potential alternative visions for his new band. The New Power Generation are superb throughout the intimate Minneapolis homecoming show on the boxset’s Blu-Ray, Prince at his peak... until the police arrived. 2 FUN BOY THREE THE COMPLETE (CHRYSALIS) The Specials get the attention, but what Terry Hall did next is possibly his most undiluted vision. There’s still nothing like the devilment of FB3’s debut, while getting David Byrne to produce the follow-up is hardly more mainstream. A cavalcade of apocalyptic partying and mighty…

THE HOT LIST 78 Eels, The Loveless, Dead Or Alive, Rachel Sage & Howard Jones, New Model Army NEW RELEASES 79 Peter Gabriel, Trevor Horn, EMF, UB40, The Killers, Joe Jackson, Black Grape, Kula Shaker, Sleater-Kinney, Grandaddy, Cast, Rebecca Ferguson, Shed Seven, Love Fame Tragedy, Gruff Rhys, The Vaccines, Jamie Webster, Sigma, Dylan John Thomas, The Reytons, Bill Ryder-Jones REISSUES 86 Portishead, Tina Turner, Milli Vanilli, Various – Now Presents Classic Disco, No-Man, Go West, Siobhan Donaghy, Depeche Mode, D:Ream, Klark Kent, Carter The Unstoppable Sex Machine, Violent Femmes, Belinda Carlisle, Sean Rowley Presents Guilty Pleasures: Best Before 1979, Various – Now Yearbook 88 Extra, Now 12” 80s: 1982 (Part 1), Now Eighties Dancefloor: Disco & Electro, Tim Finn & Phil Manzanera, Alesha Dixon, Cocteau Twins, Black Box Recorder, Wizzard,…

DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON ★★★ Look, we’d all like Trevor Horn to still be spending six weeks perfecting the bass on a revolutionary band’s debut single. Trevor is now 74, though. It’s not going to happen. Even a perfectionist like Horn has his limits, and he now seems to spend his working life accepting jobs on the basis of “Is this going to be a lark?” After working with Robbie Williams, All Saints and Tony Hadley on the self-explanatory Reimagines The Eighties in 2019, Horn now oversees a broader range of covers with a fairly similar cast of singers. Marillion’s Steve Hogarth is back, his restrained power suitable for an ambient Drive. Of course Horn’s favourite singer Seal is also here, having a very lovely time indeed bringing a tropicália mood to…

EMI ★★★ Announced at relatively short notice in November, by their standards The Killers’ new Best Of is an oddly muted release. The reason seems simple: despite recent singles Your Side Of Town and Spirit being The Killers’ finest pop moments since The Man (borrowing heavily from New Order and Underworld respectively), Brandon Flowers has said that he’s abandoned what was meant to be their accompanying album, because he no longer feels convincing as a pop singer. Instead, Flowers wants to focus on mining the more introspective, personally meaningful side he felt flourished on previous LP, Pressure Machine. While Flowers is to be applauded for his honesty, it’s also frustrating for anyone who believes Pressure Machine was too in thrall to Bruce Springsteen and lacked the colour of The Killers’…

STRANGE FOLK ★★★ With songs titled Gaslighting, Idontwannapaymytaxes and F-Bombs, Kula Shaker’s first album with their complete original line-up since 1999’s Peasants, Pigs And Astronauts threatens to offer incoherent nonsense about the MSM from the off. Sure enough, while Gaslighting is a lively opener in the Hey Dude vein, those other two songs derail the album entirely for six minutes. Crispian Mills is furious that his taxes are being used “to pay for World War III”, while F-Bombs is essentially Culture Club’s The War Song only with actual swearing, to show just how ruddy cross Mills is. It won’t alter the Israel/Palestine conflict. Both should have been left in the rehearsal room, and hopefully won’t overshadow what generally returns Kula Shaker to their early deft mix of psych-rock and Indian…

REPUBLIC ★★★★ Reforming for 2017’s middling Kicking Up The Dust LP, John Power now assesses that album as Cast kicking the tyres, working out if they could still connect in the studio. If they were to make more new music rather than take the easy route of nostalgia concerts, the quartet wanted it to properly matter. Produced by Youth, Power views Cast’s seventh album as returning him to the energy he had after leaving The La’s and before making his second band’s debut, All Change. It’s a bold ambition, but one Love Is The Call mostly lives up to. The title track, I Have Been Waiting and Look Around at the start of Side Two are especially thrilling, Power sounding as boisterous as the Fine Time days fronting a band…

BRIGHT ANTENNA ★★★★ The second solo album from The Wombats’ singer Murph is a more personal set, following his 2020 debut, which featured Pixies, Alt-J and Soundgarden. Buoyed by his day-job band confirming their rebirth with a first No.1 LP in 2022, Murph celebrates with an ultrapop workout variously resembling Keane, Haircut 100 and, on Ain’t No Need To Try’s falsetto frenzy, Scissor Sisters. Lyrically, there are travails about keeping a family together, but the gliding basslines and syncopated grooves mean Murph’s vocals are more confident than his doubts would suggest.  JE…

MODERN SKY ★★★★ With a 40,000-capacity Liverpool homecoming stadium show booked for next July, fiery singer-songwriter Jamie Webster’s rise is cemented here by a heartwarming third album full of his biggest dreams and bigger choruses. Billy Bragg narrates the carnival air of Fickle Fran, rising soul singer Brooke Combe brings joy on Better Day, but it’s the tender heart at the centre of the poignant Lovers In The Supermarket and impassioned fire of the Waterboys mood in The Boy/The Girl that shows how Webster got so huge on his own terms. JE…

REYTONS ★★★★ The first act to headline their local Rotherham stadium since T-Rex, the rowdy quartet capitalise on their self-released What’s Rock And Roll? album reaching No.1 with a more varied third LP. Still specialising in direct indie dancefloor singalongs, they now encompass Feeder anthemics in Listen, a Squirrel And G-Man-era Happy Mondays strut on Let Me Breathe and a heavier Thin Lizzy party on What She Won’t Do. Throw in the kind of picaresque everyday life chronicles of Madness and it’s easy to hear why they are now following in Marc Bolan’s footsteps. JE…

ONE LITTLE INDEPENDENT/BURNING SHED ★★★★/★★☆ No-Man’s 1990 debut single was an unlikely Donovan cover, Colours, unwittingly pre-empting trip-hop and tailormade for critics who were fond of ornate, melodramatic descriptions. With Tim Bowness’ breathy melancholy and Steven Wilson’s arrangements distinguished by dusty beats and violin flourishes, it was moving, elegant, and loosely indicative of their urge to create art-pop in the mould of Japan or Trevor Horn’s ambitious ZTT aesthetic. By 1994, they’d released two albums and a singles collection – including a remixed Colours – which maintained this tradition ever more extravagantly, and Housekeeping gathers these, plus assorted singles, bonus tracks and radio sessions. If Wilson now enjoys success both solo and with Porcupine Tree – not to mention as a prolific surround sound mixer of catalogue by acts such…

SONY ★★★★ The Mode and Anton Corbijn really were a match made in Super 8 heaven. Finally out on DVD (and Blu-Ray), Strange/ Strange Too compiles the original 1988 and 1990 VHS/laserdisc collections featuring the cornerstones of the visual identity the Dutch filmmaker created for the band. They played no small part in their journey from second division synth-poppers to arguably the world’s biggest cult act. The Strange promos – from A Question Of Time to Behind The Wheel – set the band against a collection of dramatic monochrome European landscapes, while Strange Too sees Corbijn move into colour for the highlights from Violator. At times, it veers between the pretentious and endearingly daft. There are some staged links between the Strange videos that are as baffling as they are…

CHRYSALIS ★★★★ Pop historians tend to write off Carter USM’s chart-topping, Glastonbury-headlining success as a baffling aberration on the road from grunge to Britpop. And sure, the hair and shorts were certainly... a choice. But if this reissue of Jim Bob and Fruitbat’s biggest-selling LP proves anything, it’s that the duo’s music is long overdue a re-evaluation, also afforded by the similarly full reissue of the preceding 30 Something. From infectious punk anthems such as Top 10 hit The Only Living Boy In New Cross to the fairground waltz of England, 1992: The Love Album blends hooky tunes and witty wordplay to create a caustic state-of-the-nation survey that, like Jim Bob’s recent solo output, puts the student bar scribblings of Idles firmly in the shade. Though, there’s no denying the…

EDSEL ★★★★ Since being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame with The Go-Go’s in 2021, Belinda Carlisle has turned her attention to her solo catalogue. Last year, Carlisle bundled her first four solo albums together as Decades Volume 1 and released half-speed remastered, heavyweight vinyl reissues of 1987’s Heaven On Earth and 1989’s Runaway Horses. This year has seen the arrival of similar vinyl editions of 1991’s Live Your Life Be Free and 1993’s Real, and now a second extras-free 4CD compilation, Decades Volume 2, assembling Carlisle’s albums from Real through to her most recent studio set, 2017’s Wilder Shores. It’s a fascinating stretch, which finds the vocalist going in some surprising directions – Wilder Shores pairs yoga chants with contemporary melodies – while settling into a…

WARNER ★★★★ She’s been a likeable presence on TV for so long, it’s easy to forget that Alesha Dixon was once pretty good at her pop star day-job, too. This vinyl reissue of her second post-Mis-Teeq solo LP is certainly a reminder of Dixon’s versatility. Whatever style is thrown at her, whether it’s the big band swing of hit The Boy Does Nothing, the 60s-influenced Xenomania production Cinderella Shoe, or Diane Warren ballad Do You Know The Way It Feels, Dixon proves adept at them all. You can’t help wishing that she would give pop another go.' BS…

CHERRY RED ★★★☆ Fresh from The Move, Roy Wood invented Wizzard, which fused Spectoresque bombast and nostalgia for early rock’n’roll with glam. He also co-invented and abandoned ELO, as well as painting a large star on his head and having vast hair – Wood did it all. The Singles Collection features singles and B-sides from both Wizzard and The Wizzo Band, this 22-track double-CD finding room for some of the most exciting records ever made in See My Baby Jive, Angel Fingers, Ball Park Incident as well as the deathless I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday. IW…

CHERRY RED ★★★★ If you fancy a 3CD of tunes that sound like they’ve replaced drums with car parts, then Control I’m Here features literal bangers from Nitzer Ebb, Age Of Chance, Front 242 and more from the clankier end of pop. The roar of the big machine comes with The Sisters Of Mercy’s Lucretia My Reflection, plus there’s pre-rave Shamen with Christopher Mayhew Says and Renegade Soundwave’s dub skank Cocaine Sex. Connecting various flavours showing inspiration for Balearic and big beat, this is a very welcome compilation. IW…

TASCHEN ★★★☆ In 1978, photographer Lynn Goldsmith joined Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band during a pivotal time in their career – the recording, promotion and tour of the classic album, Darkness On The Edge Of Town. As explained by The Boss himself in the foreword, it was a time of frustration due to a lengthy battle with his former manager that essentially silenced him for three years. Goldsmith’s lens captured Bruce and the band as they readied the record that would regain the momentum they’d built up with Born To Run. Shot in the studio, onstage, on the tour bus, in hotel rooms and backstage, these photos provide a unique insight into Bruce’s world and perfectly capture the grit and drive of her subject. Dressed down in his…

WHITE RABBIT ★★★★★☆ As another year passes without that now elusive new Cure album, fans are being rewarded for their patience by Simon Price, who has penned the ultimate guide to Robert Smith & co in Curepedia. As the title suggests, Price’s book is a complete anthology of the band, from A Forest to Zoology and everything – and we mean everything – in between. A veritable rabbit hole of trivia pertaining to the group, Price embroiders facts, mythology and academia to create a rich tapestry of The Cure. Delving so much deeper than a traditional song-by-song guide to their back catalogue (though it serves as that, too), entries also include the inspiration and influences behind their music and iconic visuals. Aside from the various line-ups, everyone that has played…

Let’s Rock has announced the lineups for four of its 2024 festivals – Leeds, Exeter, Shrewsbury and Southampton. Headliners include UB40 Featuring Ali Campbell – who are making their Let’s Rock debut – plus The Human League and Squeeze, while Martin Kemp is taking to the wheels of steel for a DJ set. Ali Campbell said: “We’re really looking forward to making our debut at Let’s Rock next summer. We’ve heard great things about the energy of the crowds at these festivals, which is something we love to tap into. Sunshine, good vibes and reggae music... the perfect summer’s evening.” In a lineup packed with CP favourites, also performing next summer are Bananarama, The Boomtown Rats, Peter Hook & The Light, Level 42, Jason Donovan and Sister Sledge as well…

Did you have any music posters on your wall growing up? Of course. Mostly the kind you’d get free with magazines, though sometimes it might be the artwork that came with albums. It was a golden era, so there’d be pictures of David Bowie, Mott The Hoople, T. Rex, Alice Cooper... What’s the first pop song you remember loving? Puff The Magic Dragon by Peter, Paul And Mary. Don’t judge me. Do you have a favourite album? It’s probably an age thing, but these days I seem to have a different one each week which I’ll play, even via an app, in order and all the way through. Right now it’s Hejira by Joni Mitchell. What about your favourite 80s album? My wife and I first played Kate Bush’s Hounds…

03 Roy Orbison and Friends: A Black And White Night premieres on American cable station Cinemax. His special guests include Bruce Springsteen, Elvis Costello, Tom Waits, Jackson Browne and k.d. lang. 16 Tina Turner performs to over 180,000 people in Rio De Janeiro, earning her a place in The Guinness Book Of Records. 09 Whitney Houston scores her sixth consecutive US No.1 with So Emotional. In the UK, the song peaks at No.5. 20 The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame ceremony inducts The Beatles, The Beach Boys, The Drifters, Bob Dylan and The Supremes. 23 Michael Jackson hits No.1 in the US with The Way You Make Me Feel. It’s the third single spun from his seventh studio album Bad. 10 Former Go-Go’s singer Belinda Carlisle makes No.1 in…

I hear music in colours.” So once sang a certain Classic Pop favourite (that’s Stephen Duffy, by the way). It’s an evocative notion that conjures up rich imagery in the mind’s eye; a feast for the senses whereby sounds are expressed in a vibrant palette of hues. But if the idea could be said to embody any musician, then first in line must surely be Stevie Wonder. For someone who has been without sight since infancy, Stevie Wonder not only hears music in colours, he sees – and paints – colours through music. Hotter Than July is the perfect embodiment of that. Just like the album cover itself that glows in sun-dappled fervour, the music within is positively bursting with colour. The kind of warm, inviting, fully-saturated tones that instantly…

It’s that time again when we cast our eye, and our ears, back over the past 12 months and wonder how those fabled new albums that we predict every year – yes, we’re talking to you Janet Jackson, The Cure, Sade, Kate Bush – have STILL not materialised. And who’d have predicted we’d get new Beatles material, though, before Rihanna... Still, it’s better to focus on what we have rather than what we don’t, and 2023 has given us plenty of fantastic new music from Depeche Mode, Kylie, OMD and Take That among others and we look forward to experiencing them in a live setting in the new year. Other big live draws in 2024 include the reunited Girls Aloud (see our news story on pages 10-11), Liam Gallagher, who…

I can’t ever see a day when we grow tired of genuine surprises here at Classic Pop, and the last 12 months saw its fair share of unexpected moments. Leading the charge was the wonderful return of Blur. While I’m rather fond of the smashand-grab informality of 2015’s Magic Whip whose release equally blindsided fans, there was something more coherent, consistent and considered about this year’s The Ballad Of Darren. With their new cuts justifiably earning their keep in the band’s 2023 festival sets and stadium shows, Damon Albarn wasn’t the only one reduced to tears by the emotional impact of their comeback. Also tugging at the heartstrings were Depeche Mode who returned with Memento Mori, their first studio album since the sad death of founder member Andy Fletcher. The…

1 EELS EELS SO GOOD: ESSENTIAL EELS, VOL 2 A follow-up to 2008’s opening volume, Eels So Good spans the band’s next 15 years and seven studio albums. Boasting hits such as Fresh Blood and That Look You Gave That Guy, new favourites from 2020’s Earth To Dora, as well as three previously unreleased songs, the compilation also features five tracks being pressed to vinyl for the first time, including Royal Pain from Shrek The Third and the Yes Man soundtrack’s Man Up. 2 THE LOVELESS MEET THE LOVELESS Marc Almond in garage rock shock! Yep, the Soft Cell frontman is ditching the synths as he presents his new project The Loveless – a covers band featuring former Sigue Sigue Sputnik guitarist Neal X, Iggy Pop’s touring rhythm section of…

EMF ★★★☆ Back as occasional tourers since 2012, 2020’s boxset From Us To You also drew attention to how much more EMF had going on in addition to Unbelievable. The boxset seemed to focus the band themselves, who released their first album for 27 years in 2022’s Go Go Sapiens. Barely a year later, that’s been improved on, at least in part by returning to work with Ralph Jezzard, producer of EMF’s first two albums. Although Jezzard has recently been in semi-retirement, he brings a familiar crunch to first single Hello People and Red Flags, the latter an especially sweaty mosh redolent of EMF’s rave roots. That illicit thrill is most explicit in the standout Reach For The Lasers. James Atkin recites a list of dance pioneers from Lindy Layton…

EARMUSIC ★★★☆ Since his 17th album Rain in 2008, Joe Jackson has released a Duke Ellington tribute record, a compilation of four EPs related to specific cities and an LP recorded in one day in Boise, Idaho, because that’s where his latest tour happened to end. Jackson, then, is one of the few musicians for whom a covers album of an obscure turn-of-thecentury music hall performer can be considered business as usual. Max Champion was wrongly assumed to be related to Harry Champion, the more successful music hall turn whose songs included Boiled Beef And Carrots and Any Old Iron – yet whose real surname was Crump. Max is sadly believed to have died during combat in World War I. His songs languished in obscurity ever since, until a dozen…

DGAFF ★★★★ Right. Can everyone stop taking Shaun Ryder for granted and pay attention to him again, please? True, Ryder has been a reliably genial constant presence on reality TV ever since first appearing on I’m A Celebrity in 2010. In among numerous other roles from ghost hunting to Gogglebox, Ryder released his proper debut solo album Visits From Future Technology in 2021: not perfect, but its single Mumbo Jumbo served notice that Shaun could still whip out loping funk from the Hallelujah school. Now comes this wonderful collection, its widescreen dusty dub and vintage soul horns evidence that Ryder is up for learning new tricks. Orange Head is his first album since he was diagnosed with ADHD, and he’s been a surprisingly reflective authority on what the condition’s effects…

MINERVA OTO ★★★☆ Rebecca Ferguson’s initial claim to fame was beating a group called One Direction (whatever happened to them?) in the seventh series of The X-Factor in 2010. In the years since, the Liverpool singer has released four albums, shared the stage with Lionel Richie and Andrea Bocelli and, most recently, collaborated on two singles with Nile Rodgers. The independently released Heaven Part II isn’t just Ferguson’s first full-length since 2016 – it’s also being billed as her final studio album. If that does turn out to be the case, she’s at least going out on a very respectable note. Heaven Part II centres her smoky voice on slinky electro (Digging For Gold), reverent R&B (the gospel-influenced I’m Going To Love You), funky, upbeat soul (Diamonds In Her Shoes),…

ROUGH TRADE ★★★★ If you’re not paying attention, it’s easy to think the solo albums of ex-Super Furry Animals frontman Gruff Rhys, who comes across as supremely laid back, constitute a louche canon. But the surface calm is invariably deceptive, as proved by Sadness Sets Me Free, via lyrics that touch on melancholy, family life and discontent over how we are governed. Replete with glorious melodies, notably on the title track and I Tendered My Resignation, it’s a set beautifully mixing a Celtic-Americana-tinged swing with orchestral pop flourishes. Jonathan Wright…

3BEAT ★★★ The drum and bass duo who’ve worked with Ellie Goulding and Take That keep the guests underground on their third album. Sampling Bitter Sweet Symphony and Tom’s Diner, they sometimes try too hard to be cinematic, with the title track seemingly designed to soundtrack a Sky Max gangster drama. It’s when they keep the beats simple and punishing, like the hard-hitting Badman and LSD, that the pair best honour their adopted home. More than a decade in, Sigma can still light up a dancefloor – albeit they sometimes need reminding that it’s their primary purpose. JE…

DOMINO ★★★★ Fresh from guesting with his old band The Coral and producing Michael Head, Bill Ryder-Jones’ fifth album is his most complete work to date. Crucially, it’s also his most optimistic. The bittersweet acoustic sway of Christinha might be expected, less so the epic anthemics of Nothing To Be Done, recalling The Flaming Lips’ most mainstream moves. Best of all, If Tomorrow Starts Without Me has Ryder-Jones as an irresistible one-man orchestra with a killer uplifting chorus. The title is Welsh for ‘Good health’ and this is guaranteed to leave you feeling brighter. JE…

SONY LEGACY ★★★ As charted in Paramount+’s new self-titled Milli Vanilli documentary, the career of Rob Pilatus and Fab Morvan reads more like a Biblical parable than a pop handbook: two broke but ambitious dancers who seemingly got their wish when they hooked up with veteran German pop guru Frank Farian, only to end up vilified on an unimaginable scale before Pilatus’ fatal drug overdose. Competent singers though the duo were, Farian basically couldn’t be bothered getting their English to the required level to get over his reliably efficient pop. It’s clear that Farian didn’t have much time for developing his artists – he made Simon Cowell look like George Martin. But, as this new 35th anniversary compilation shows, Farian also knew how to keep up with current pop trends.…

CHRYSALIS ★★★ Sandwiched in-between their two hitmaking phases, Go West’s second album Dancing On The Couch almost feels like a lost LP. All three singles were paid dust on their 1987 release, each failing to make the UK Top 40. Across the pond, the album only just scraped the Billboard 200. Winning Best British Newcomer at the previous year’s BRITs appeared to have been a curse. This 3CD+1DVD (or 2LP) reissue doesn’t exactly make the case that it’s a lost classic. The blustering New Wave rock of I Want To Hear It From You and True Colours are simply inferior retreads of what had gone before. Likewise Let’s Build A Boat, which was substituted for an indistinguishable sequel to early hit Don’t Look Down in the Stateside edition, is…

NEWSTATE  ★★★☆ Far more enjoyable a compilation than a duo generally assumed to be one-hit wonders would lead you to expect, D:Ream’s Best Of is an overdue reminder that they were a solid pop-rave proposition, before New Labour’s appropriation of Things Can Only Better torpedoed the rest of their songs for good. Focusing mainly on debut album D:Ream On Volume 1, its seven songs here retain an effervescent bounce, the harmonica-driven Unforgiven a visceral banger that would have fitted on U2’s Achtung Baby. Only I Like It – oddly like a flat remix of a non-existent better song – and sole ballad Star (think track eight on a Gary Barlow solo album) are disappointments. There should have been room for something from Peter Cunnah and Al MacKenzie’s two 21st Century…

DEMON ★★★ It’s 20 years since DJ Sean Rowley popularised the notion of guilty pleasures. The term seemed clunky even back then, and it hasn’t aged well. However, one of its underlying ideas – that some great pop records get, if not quite lost, at least shoved to the back of record collections as being a bit naff – is true. In which case, around half the songs on this 70-track 4CD (or cutdown 29-song 2LP) of singles from the 70s have been unfairly maligned, because there are some absolute classics here. For example, CD1, subtitled MW: All The Hits And More, finds space for a clutch of British hits, including prime ELO with Sweet Talkin’ Woman, the glorious Hold On To Love by Peter Skellern (MOR’s version of Bill…

CRAFT ★★☆ For casual fans: yes, the Wisconsin punks’ debut is the album with Blister In The Sun on. Reissued for its 40th anniversary, and with the Femmes back touring despite a 2007 lawsuit from bassist Brian Ritchie against singer Gordon Gano over their biggest hit’s use in a Wendy’s advert, here’s chance for newcomers to discover what else they had going on. Truth is, not much. A classic example of a band constantly refining one idea, only twanging ballad Confessions varies the Blister formula any. Gano sounds uncertain, the band anonymous, the song shrugs into nothing after five long minutes. Prove My Love immediately returns them to the familiar jittery drums and wheedling vocals that serves them well. Gano’s distinctive whine can get uncomfortable: Add It Up’s proto-incel pleas…

UMC/PROPER ★★★★ Milk And Kisses’ relatively harmonious inception suggested Cocteau Twins had survived the turbulence of 1993’s predecessor Four-Calendar Café. But within a year, the trio were no more. Their eighth LP, reissued on vinyl, remains a beguiling send-off, marrying Liz Fraser’s ethereal tones with Robin Guthrie’s gossamer guitars across 10 tracks. Recorded a year before his death, Jeff Buckley tribute Rilkean Heart packs an emotional punch, while the backwards-sung Violaine and operatics of Eperdu prove that few could make the unintelligible sound so profound. JO…

MUTE ★★★★ Complete with its controversial acid blotting paper sleeve, Sheet One was revolutionary in bringing minimalism to the then frenetic sound of techno in 1993. The first in a series of vinyl reissues for Richie Hawtin’s alias, Plastikman’s debut has an emotional heft in the slow-build shivers of Drp and Koma. For all its atmospherics, Sheet One still packs a punch, with the menacing Helikopter and appropriately squelchy Glob remaining able to deposit the unwary listener into the middle of next week. Finally back out on digital, too, Plastikman’s thrills are the real deal. JE…

BLINK PUBLISHING ★★★★☆ When picking up someone’s third autobiography, it is often with a sense of ‘What can be said that we don’t already know?’, particularly when 1995’s Take It Like A Man is one of the definitive celebrity memoirs. George addresses this in the preface, explaining that maturity and wisdom offer a very different perspective on retrospection, and this becomes apparent almost immediately. Scores are undoubtedly settled, though it is himself that George is hardest on throughout, accepting responsibility and looking at things from the viewpoint of others, displaying a self-awareness he had previously lacked. Nonetheless, Karma is a huge amount of fun, packed with both crazy characters and hilarious anecdotes. The excess of the 80s is epitomised by trips on Concorde to party in New York with Warhol…

MOONBOY ★★★☆ As one of the most creatively fertile movements in music and fashion, the New Romantics in the early 80s exuded style and substance. Following on from glam and punk, this colourful collective posed and preened for anyone that would point a camera at them. Photographer Sheila Rock was in the thick of it – a significant chronicler of the scene. As her vibrant images made their way into The Face, her lens proved a gateway to success for some of the definitive musicians, designers, photographers, stylists and artists of the next decade and beyond. New Romantics, her stunning reportage of London’s nocturnal playground, takes in legendary nightspots such as Billy’s, The Blitz, The People’s Palace and Taboo. Even Finsbury Park tube station is transformed into an otherworldly entity…